I just got my first ham radio: It’s a TIDRADIO UV-5R (essentially a Baofeng UV-5R capable of transmitting at 8 watts). I had the folks over at Mojave Repeater program it for me, and I think they did a pretty great job; I get all the MURS, FRS, and GMRS frequencies as well as all the local fire, police, EMS, and repeater stations. From what I gather, they just pull them from radioreference.com, but for a neophyte like me it’s still pretty awesome.
After toying around with it for a while, I ordered an FTDI programming cable and a couple of stock UV-5Rs that I can clone the custom firmware to. If I can get Chirp to talk to these radios, I plan on routing them through my Lunchbox repeater for use in hiking and general adventuring.
Until then, I’ll be working on getting my GMRS and amateur technician licenses. Here’s what I’m running:
- TD-UV5R with extended battery and TD-771 antenna
- BridgeCom BCS-200 speaker mic
- Lunchbox simplex repeater